nd looked down at him. Matson, empty
of expression, stared back, and again Frank Corson sensed rather than
saw the emptiness behind the eyes.

"How are you feeling?"

"I feel very--well."

"It wasn't a bad break. How would you like to leave the hospital?"

"I would like to leave the--hospital."

Frank felt an odd, inner frustration. What in the devil was wrong with
the man? He sounded like a child just learning the language. Yet there
was nothing else to indicate backwardness. He looked pretty much like a
self-sufficient, self-contained adult.

"I can sign you out--get you a pair of crutches. By the way, I don't
think the hospital got your home address."

"My home--address?"

"Yes. The place you live." There was a pause, and finally Frank realized
the man wasn't going to answer. "Your home, man. Where you live."

"I'm looking for a--home."

"Oh, I see. New in town?"

"Yes, new in--town."

"I have a place," Frank said, and it seemed to him as though someone
else were talking from within him--that he was only a listener. "You can
crowd in with me until you get settled somewhere."

"I can crowd in with--you?"

"Okay?"

"Okay."

"Fine, I'll see that you're signed out. Ever walk on crutches before?"

"I never walked on--crutches."

"Nothing much to it. You'll get the knack."

Frank left the bed and headed toward the office, asking himself as he
went, _Why in hell did I do that?_ Then he found the reason--or at least
a reason that would suffice.

The discovery of a man with two hearts might be worth something. At
least, it would put Frank Corson, unknown intern, into the spotlight for
a while. This was pretty vague thinking but it made a kind of sense and
Frank settled for it in lieu of trying to analyze the strange
compulsion, the odd foreboding deep within him.

_Here's a thing that might do me some good_, he told himself. _Why not
take advantage of it?_

Perhaps he was rigidly blocking out the cause of his unrest--that he was
more or less dependent upon Rhoda Kane for the luxuries that were
involved in seeing her, having a relationship with her. He could neither
ask her to dine with him on his level, at some place like Nedick's, nor
could he refuse to go with her to The Forum or the Four Seasons. He
could not take her to his miserable furnished room on East 13th Street,
nor refuse rendezvous in her Upper East Side apartment.

He was trapped and was thus desperately looking for a way out.

A